FTR, it's been happening since before the "free to play" update (prior to the 5s release). It's just more noticeable/frequent now for me, because I've got a handful of the top cars with max upgrades, and the faster they go, the more demanding the graphic rendering becomes. What I'm curious about, is how the performance is on the iPad5(Air). Like I said, it seems less noticeable on the 5s. Unfortunately, I rarely play on that device so I can't give a true assessment. I do know that it's still an issue, but I can't speak to the magnitude of it due to insufficient testing. What version of iOS is your iPad3 running. I only ask because that's an important factor for GL-Ryan to report back to the devs. The more info they have, the better chance they have to pinpoint the issue.
I'm curious, is there a way for a handful of us here on TA to set up some races just between us (not ghost chases, but actual races). I would love to race Running Bird, if only out of respect for his legitimate awesomeness (he's dipped down to 98th in the overall rankings last I checked, since the rampant cheating has allowed a bunch of no-talent hacks to steal the rating he earned). I already know I'd get smoked, but I'd love to have the option. I'm pretty confident in my abilities, I'd love to put them up against some non-cheating counterparts. The MP stuff right now sucks. I played two races last night, and ran both tracks flawlessly while hitting mass nitros with a maxed out Veneno. I wasn't within 10 seconds of the winner in either race (one had a maxed FXX, the other also had the Veneno, neither were using the nitro or tuning boost). They were both long gone within 15 seconds of the race starting, never saw them again. ETA - I had my ranking up to 800 something when I was at level 18 (~1390 "score"). Then the cheaters took back over, and I've dropped to 2,950 rank with a 1276 score) at level 21. I've won 78 out of 167 races. Two nights ago, it was 72/134 wins. I want to rock MP a lot, but I'm hesitant to do so because it just screws my ranking when I have to battle infinite nitro hackers. Obviously the local wi-fi option won't work, but is there some way to set up a real race between chosen friends that I'm missing? FYI, if anyone wants to become friends, I'm NineNines on Gamecenter, and you can PM me for my FB info. I need some A8 friends. My current friends list is at 0. Also, if anyone else wants to send me their info, I'd be glad to add (I need a ghost victory for my medal count).
@slightreturn Not yet, multiplayer Lobbies and the ability to invite people has been requested ere many times, so hopefully it is something the devs will do. I didn't play mp before because of the cheaters, and am disappointed that they have returned so quickly (I still haven't played more than two mp races) My GC ID is MES.82 feel free to add me, I find challenging ghosts is great fun try beating y times - i can get competitive but normally lose
Like Mess said, there isn't yet. The Dev team has told me it's something they would like to do so it's just a matter of them squeezing it in to an update.
Indeed, a lot of the frame rate issues seem to be on devices that are running iOS 7 and I think we are still trying to perfect how our games interact with the new OS.
I'm still on 6.1.3 on my iPad 4 since I couldn't stand the laggy ios7. And yes I had the stutters even before this free to play update.
Thanks for your kind words! To be honest, I'm not even sure if my latest dipping (from approximately 1660 to approximately 1560) was directly related to the return of the cheaters. I just kept getting knocked out by Silver Lightnings one day, and with the new tuning boost, those d*mn things out-accelerate and kill you at race launch regardless of whether they're cheaters, if they happen to start behind you. (I have a maxed-out Silver Lightning, too, but I just don't like the way they handle.) And the problem with the top ranks is that even if you finish second in a race, that often means losing ten or more points, because most of the opponents have hundreds of points less. And you just get one measly point if you win the same race. So losing 100 points within an hour or so just happens sometimes. The cheaters, on the other hand, don't necessarily have a negative impact on your score. The successful ones usually have more points than any honest player could amass, and if you finish second after them, you don't lose as many points. It still sucks to see them win and lead the world series, of course. And that is something that Gameloft still hasn't done anything about. Anyway, I'd love private/inivitation-only races as well. In the meantime, though, it is possible to encounter one another in multiplayer. I had a lot of fun racing _Super_Racer_ a while ago, for example. I had falsely accused him of cheating, but it turns out I had gotten confused by the combination of his awesomeness and some sync artifacts. For now, my advice would be to use slower cars in multiplayer. Cheaters like S class cars, but B- and C-class car can be just as much fun. And there are less cheaters there.
Anyone having frame rate issues on the later levels on an ipad mini (1st gen)? In series 7 & 8, the frame rate often dropped really low. It was unplayable. I tried rebooting the device etc, no effect. But turning off wifi seems to fix it. (Tho your ghosts etc don't get uploaded). Anyone else noticed this?
That is good advice, thanks. I'm curious how the opponents are chosen though. Is it based on the car's rank, to a degree? Obviously they won't be able to match up opponents flawlessly, but are there ranges of car ranks that generally are attempted to be placed together? If that's the case, what are the cutoffs? I ask mostly because I tried using a lower class car a couple times, but still found myself matched against well upgraded Venenos and other highly ranked A and S class cars. I was racing with a maxed 458 Italia (1484 rank points) and I wasn't even competitive with the other cars out there, which were all 1550ish to the Agera's max, rank wise. Finally, I think I've found a good niche with the Alpha Romeo 8C, which maxes at 1357 points. The races I've done with it have mostly matched up against B class cars, and some A class cars that have limited upgrades. I'm gonna keep trying to find some other good cars that get fit in with equal counterparts. I think the maxed Citroen Survolt is probably a good one. I'm fond of the cars that get off the line quickly, even if their top speed is a little lower, like the Veneno. By being first to the nitros, you can get the boosts that compensate for the lower top speed (as well as keeping your opponents from getting the nitro which slows them down). Thanks for the advice, RB!
I feel that matchmaking is mainly car rating (not inclusive of class). So if I have a car ~1000, my opponents will have cars of similar range. If you are in queue for a while, the search will broaden and end up having an unbalanced match (C classes with S class, for example). My current favourite for multiplayer is a partially upgraded Lotus, which gets matched with Citroen Survolts (and is somewhat of an easy win). There seems to be particular thresholds for rating matching, where upgrading your car just a bit further can lead to you being the lowest rating in a match.
That makes sense, thanks. What upgrades do you have on your Lotus, if you don't mind me asking? That's definitely the type of car I like to race with due to its quick acceleration. I'm finding that using the nitro starting boost increases your chances in MP drastically. For one, it gives you the head start (especially with cars like the Veneno), but it also helps assure you not to get run over by somebody else boosting off the line. I guess I'm more of a finesse racer, in that I always try to avoid other racers, but some of these people just go all out trying to crash you. It's nice to leave them in the dust so I can just do my thing.
Yeah. That's my least favorite thing about Asphalt 8. The Survolt and the Lotus are both good cars for staying alive at race launch — I think the Survolt usually has a slightly better change at winning (when you compare the maxed-out versions of both cars), but the whine gets on my nerves, so I'm glad I can switch to the Lotus sometimes. As for slightly higher-rated cars, have you tried the McLaren 12 Spider? I haven't raced it in multiplayer in a while, but it used to do great there. By the way, I think I have everyone beat in every ghost race now. Sorry for using boosts on some occasions — they were necessary to beat the one infinite nitro cheater among my "friends". (Unfriending cheaters on Game Center doesn't remove them from your individual ghost race rankings, unfortunately, and I couldn't stand seeing him at #1. ) -- EDIT: I just did a couple of races with the Alpha Romeo 8C, after reading your recommendation. That's a great multiplayer car, too! Lots of different competitors.
Yes, the game will try to put you in a race with cars which have rankings that are "close". Sometimes, the range of rankings can be +/- 100 points or more. The boosts (Nitro Starter, Tuning Kit) could be useful since they probably don't (?) affect your car rank. I find in multiplayer that getting ahead of your competitors in the first 5 seconds is crucial since all the mayhem and crashes happen in those first 5 seconds. After that, hopefully, you're at 1st position, or you are close to 1st position and only have a few cars to contend with. So I think a Nitro Start boost is probably the best investment you can make. Once I'm at the 1st position after 10 seconds, I know I've won that race in most cases and everything else is making sure you don't make any mistakes, follow a clean line, and capture the maximum number of nitro boosts. Some things I learned (which many of you know already): - There are some courses where there is a long continuous string of obstacles, such as pillars in the underground passage in Barcelona Reverse. I love going through them since it's as good as getting a nitro boost. - I always vote for Classic or Elimination. Infection is just too random and you have non-trivial probability that you will lose to a lower skilled person, depending on random luck. I hate that. - The number of ranking points you get seems to be based on the difference of your rank and your competitors' ranks. If you're ranked higher, winning the race just seems to net only a few points, sometimes just a measly 1 point! I'm at a point where if I come in 2nd, I will definitely lose ranking points. Every race is a now a nail-biter since I know I have to place 1st. This is my first post to TouchArcade, hello everyone! I'm Flatwell on Apple GameCenter. I'm a noob, but I've been slowly working my way through singleplayer and multiplayer. In singleplayer, I'm at 890/900 stars. The last few singleplayer races are much harder than the rest. I find I need to upgrade my cars to even have a chance at completing all the Season 8 races. In multiplayer, my rating is 1516 and ranked 178th globally. I've friended Running Bird (1633 rating!) and SlightReturn (NineNines) (1374 rating) and Mess (MES.82) (1049 rating) from TouchArcade. If anyone wants to friend me, feel free! Just mention that you saw me on TouchArcade. Otherwise, I may reject random friend requests.
Some random interesting stats from my game. I'm sure others have much better stats in this forum. I would love to see them! Barrel roll knockdowns: 3 Knockdowns of the same racer in one race: 6 Barrel rolls in one jump: 7 Flat spins in one jump: 6 (someone has got to have a better number than this!) Max air time in one jump: 9.97s MP races played: 237 MP races wins: 170 I still DO NOT have the 100 Obstacles medal. Which course can you get that?
Haha, you took down my ghosts as quickly as I could put them up. Sorry for using the boosts, I did it without even thinking about it as I already had them activated from racing MP. I was so proud when I beat your time on the S8 Agera R French Guiana race with the nitro and tuning boost, but then you came back and beat me shortly after with only the tuning boost! I haven't tried the Mclaren Spider yet, but I'll give that a chance, thanks.
Welcome to TA, Flatwell! Thanks for adding me. I agree that Classic/Elimination are the best for MP. While I think Infected is a neat idea, it does make it to where to many fluky things can happen, and I'd much rather have the control for the exact reasons you noted. Fortunately, most other people feel the same way. Out of the 224 MP races I've done, only one has been the Infected format. In fact, probably 220 of them have been Classic, with just a few Eliminations to fill in the rest. I got the 100 Obstacles medal in the S8 B Class London Elimination race. The elimination races are best because you can get more than two laps in, plus there's no traffic to get in your way. The best strategy is to take a different route each of the first two laps, and then try to pick up as many of the obstacles that you missed for as long as you can until time the final competitor is eliminated in the third lap. Here's my stats (you've got me beat across the board with the exception of FS's in one jump where we're tied) Barrel roll knockdowns: 2 Knockdowns of the same racer in one race: 5 Barrel rolls in one jump: 6 Flat spins in one jump: 6 Max air time in one jump: 8.55s MP Races played: 224 MP Races won: 113
Cripes, you guys are good. It took me a lot more races to get the kinds of stats and race results you have. Speaking of a lot of races... Barrel roll knockdowns: 7 Knockdowns of the same racer in one race: 6 Barrel rolls in one jump: 8 Flat spins in one jump: 5 Max air time in one jump: 6.43 s (Where the heck do you guys get those ridiculous air times? Alps reverse?) MP Races played: 2482 MP Races won: 1386 In my defense, my won/played ratio has been improving ever since 7283618 and some of his fellow cheaters have stopped playing. As for the boosts, it would be nice if one could disable/pause them for ghost races, but I understand that making that possible wouldn't exactly be an economically wise move for Gameloft. So I guess we should just accept them as reality and stop apologizing for using them.
